The Middle Ages of European history lasted from the 5th to the 15th century.

It began with the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and the subsequent formation of new kingdoms by barbarian invaders. The Franks, under the Carolingian dynast y, established an empire covering much of Western Europe; the Carolingian Empire endured until the 9th century. During the High Middle Ages, which began after A D 1000, the population of Europe increased as technological and agricultural inn ovations allowed trade to flourish and crop yields to increase. Western European Christians attempted to regain control of the Holy Land in the Crusades. Intell ectual life was marked by scholasticism and the founding of universities. The ph ilosophy of Thomas Aquinas, the paintings of Giotto, the poetry of Dante and Cha ucer, the travels of Marco Polo, and the architecture of Gothic cathedrals are a mong the outstanding achievements of this period. The Late Middle Ages was marke d by famine, plague, and war; between 1347 and 1350, the Black Death killed abou t a third of Europeans. Cultural and technological developments transformed Euro pean society, leading to the early modern period